ISSUE: 2020 No. 1 ISSN 2335-6677 RESEARCHERS AT ISEAS – YUSOF ISHAK INSTITUTE ANALYSE CURRENT EVENTS Singapore |3 January 2020 Jokowi’s Management of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU): A New Order Approach? Norshahril Saat and Aninda Dewayanti* EXECUTIVE SUMMARY • Many considered Joko (Jokowi) Widodo’s pick of Ma’ruf Amin as his running mate in the last election to mean Nahdlatul Ulama’s (NU) return to power. After all, the NU-affiliated political party, PKB (National Awakening Party) also continued supporting the incumbent president. • In August 2018, the NU central board (PBNU) also declared its support to Jokowi, as did Yenny Wahid, the great-granddaughter of NU founder KH Hasyim Asy’ari. • Yet, some quarters in NU were upset with Jokowi’s appointment of a former military general as the Minister of Religious Affairs, a position normally reserved for NU because this Ministry controls the religious boarding schools. • A similarity in treatment of NU is noticed between Jokowi’s administration and late Suharto regime, which is in the ensuring that diverse groups within the organization are given access to the government. This shows that religious groups are not static and homogeneous, but has to be understood in terms of inter- and intra- organizational contestation. *Norshahril Saat is Fellow at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute and Co-coordinator of the Indonesian Studies Programme. He is the author of The State, Ulama and Islam in Malaysia and Indonesia. Aninda Dewayanti is Research Officer at the institute, specialising in Indonesian studies. 1 ISSUE: 2020 No. 1 ISSN 2335-6677 INTRODUCTION On 23 October 2019, Indonesian President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) announced the Cabinet for his second term in office (from 2019 to 2024). While some members from the previous Cabinet were retained, he made some shocking appointments, such as the selection of his opponent Prabowo Subianto as the Defence Minister, despite the latter’s human rights record. Before the announcement, some questions were also raised whether Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) members would feature strongly in this new Cabinet, since NU leaders openly supported the president throughout the election campaign. After all, NU’s Rois Syuriah (Supreme Leader), Ma’ruf Amin, was named his running mate, which many saw as the incumbent’s move to court support from the largest Islamic organisation in the country.1 Sometime in August 2018, the NU central board (PBNU) had already declared its backing for Jokowi, and two months before the April election, Jokowi officiated the 2019 NU National Assembly (munas) in Kota Banjar. Although not representing PBNU, Yenny Wahid, the daughter of former president Abdurrahman Wahid (Gus Dur), and great- granddaughter of NU founder Kyai Haji Hasyim Asy’ari, also lent her support for him. With Jokowi’s re-election, Ma’ruf Amin, who was also the chairman of Ulama Council of Indonesia (MUI), is now Vice-President. Many would expect that with Ma’ruf now the second in command, NU would be more assertive in the government. The new cabinet line-up, however, shows that NU leaders are marginalised. Jokowi did not even consider NU’s role as the leading actor in the country’s religious affairs. Historically, NU leaders have always targeted the position of Minister of Religious Affairs (MORA), but the appointment of retired military general Fachrul Razi as the MORA is reminiscent of President Suharto’s choice of Alamsjah Ratoe Perwiranegara, also a military general, as the MORA from 1978 to 1983 (see Table 3). Explaining the rationale for his choice, Jokowi said that the government is serious in combating radicalism.2 Although Jokowi placed Zainut Tauhid (a PPP politician with NU background) as the deputy religious minister,3 the NU community was rather “displeased” because the highest Islamic power and authority in the country is not in NU’s hands. The Ministry holds the key not only to policies regarding religious education, but also the purse strings of the Islamic boarding school (pesantren), which are mostly run by NU. Jokowi’s treatment of NU is evocative of how the organisation was treated by the Suharto’s New Order (1966-1998). This article focuses on the management of NU under Jokowi administration. NU TRADITION AND POLITICAL HISTORY Formed in 1926, NU is the largest Islamic mass organisation in the world – it has more than 50 million followers in Indonesia alone, known as ‘citizens of NU’ or nahdliyyin. It oversees more than 12,000 pesantren across the country,4 and represents the traditionalist school of thought which aims to protect rituals and practices from modernism and reformism. Its rival is the Muhammadiyah, commonly referred to as a modernist organization.5 Since its formation, NU has been purely a grassroots-based civil society organisation focussing on social issues. In 1943, NU joined Masyumi, a non-political organisation formed by the Japanese government.6 The Muhammadiyah also joined that organization, which was intended to strengthen Japanese rule in Indonesia. In 1945, NU became officially involved in party politics after Masyumi.7 The religious leaders (ulama) played a vital role among the nahdliyyin by elevating themselves to become part of the national elite class. Patronage networks between the ulama and the nahdliyyin solidify political support for NU. 2 ISSUE: 2020 No. 1 ISSN 2335-6677 In 1952, NU separated from Masyumi to become a political party, the NU Party. Among the reasons for NU’s departure was that it lost the position of MORA, and that Masyumi began to be dominated by the modernist camp led by the charismatic Mohammad Natsir.8 In the 1955 elections, NU defied sceptics by obtaining 18.4 percent of the popular vote to become the third largest party in Indonesia after the PNI (Indonesia Nationalist Party) and Masyumi. Even the PKI (Communist Party of Indonesia) received less votes than NU. The suspension of democracy after President Sukarno introduced Guided Democracy 1956— which also contributed to the banning of Masyumi in 1960—, and a military coup in 1966 by Suharto, meant that NU’s role in electoral politics also stagnated. There were after all no more elections until 1971. Under the New Order government (1966-1998), Suharto sought to limit NU’s influence. Some may even argue that he was more tolerant of the modernists than of NU. This was exemplified by the appointments of non-NU oriented individuals as MORA, which had always been NU’s crown jewel under the Sukarno government. Suharto was never impressed with NU leaders’ Islamic orientation, which was not pro-development and progress. NU members, however, in considering NU the bigger organisation with more members compared to Muhammadiyah, felt they should be prioritised in key appointments, particularly on religious matters. President Suharto’s policy of right-sizing the political system saw NU merging with other Islam-based parties into the United Development Party (PPP) in 1973. In the same vein, all nationalist parties were merged under the PDI (Indonesian Democratic Indonesia) banner. Suharto drove the merger of all Islamic parties because he feared they would threaten his government, even though Islamic parties controlled only 27.2 percent of the seats in the legislative assembly in 1971. This pales in comparison to their performance in 1955, where they garnered 43.5 percent of the seats.9 From 1973 onwards, PPP became one of three political parties allowed to contest in elections, the other two being Suharto’s Golkar (Party of Functional Groups) and PDI. Even though NU was the largest among the Islamic parties, its leaders did not occupy important leadership positions in the PPP. No doubt NU chairman Idham Khalid was made PPP President in 1973, but subsequently, other NU leaders played less significant roles. Interestingly, after 1973, Suharto never appointed any NU member as MORA. In 1984, NU withdrew from formal politics, and returned to the spirit of the organisation’s founder and functioned once again as a social organization. This resulted in internal divisions and a diminishing role for the ulama. NU formally detached itself from formal politics through the declaration of Kembali ke Khittah ‘26 (Return to the Guidelines of 1926) during Muktamar Situbondo. The initiative was led by the so-called “progressive NU group” 10 which consisted of activists from the third generation of NU, including Abdurrahman Wahid (Gus Dur) and Mustafa Bisri. This brought about a renewal in religious though, a reactivation of NU’s role in social efforts, and a renaissance in NU’s leadership.11 Kembali ke Khittah ‘26 proved a critical juncture for NU as an institution, readjusting the role of the pesantren as the centre of learning and as agents of change. The move stimulated the emergence of intellectual institutions such as P3M (Association for the Development of Pesantren and Society) and LKiS (Institute for Islamic and Social Studies). This came to foster a contextualised approach to Islamic jurisprudence as opposed to the literary interpretation of texts, a rejuvenation of leadership down to pesantren level, and the injecting of progressive ideas and philosophy into NU. 3 ISSUE: 2020 No. 1 ISSN 2335-6677 Khittah ’26 later became a political tool for Gus Dur’s political ambitions, and some NU members would after that change remain active in the political scene. NU was further split into two groups: a political arm and a civil society arm. The latter was further divided into a conservative and a progressive camp. The fall of Suharto in 1998, resulting from the reformasi movement, accentuated this division within the organization. State elites capitalised on it by co-opting some members into the government, thus splitting the organization further by encouraging competition among the different factions. These various factions within NU sought to influence the government from within, to ensure that allies were in positions of power so that NU and individual interests could be fulfilled.